COUPLE'S HAPPINESS GRATES ON MAN WHO FELT BETRAYED
DEAR CR-ABBY: My first serious relationship lasted a year and ended more than eight years ago. "Stacy" was terrific, but we were very different, and our relationship came to an amicable end.
Several months later, I heard that Stacy had begun dating a close friend of mine, "Alex," soon after our breakup. Needless to say, I was devastated. Alex's betrayal was as painful or more so than that of Stacy. I broke off all contact with them in an attempt to salvage my dignity. I haven't spoken to either one since.
All these years later, I am happily married to a wonderful woman. I hear through the grapevine occasionally that Stacy and Alex are still together. Whenever I do, I feel unaccountably upset. It's not that I'm pining for an old flame, because I wouldn't trade my wife for any woman on Earth. I have thought a lot about it and believe I am clinging to the naive belief -- or hope -- that people who do unkind, deceitful things always come to regret it in the end.
I am grappling with the guilt of wishing unhappiness for two people who are obviously happy together. I can't help it, but I know I'd be glad if I learned they'd broken up. I am confused and embarrassed about why I even still care. Your thoughts, please?
-- LACKING CLOSURE IN SAN JOSE
DEAR CR-ABBY: My first serious relationship lasted a year and ended more than eight years ago. "Stacy" was terrific, but we were very different, and our relationship came to an amicable end.
Several months later, I heard that Stacy had begun dating a close friend of mine, "Alex," soon after our breakup. Needless to say, I was devastated. Alex's betrayal was as painful or more so than that of Stacy. I broke off all contact with them in an attempt to salvage my dignity. I haven't spoken to either one since.
All these years later, I am happily married to a wonderful woman. I hear through the grapevine occasionally that Stacy and Alex are still together. Whenever I do, I feel unaccountably upset. It's not that I'm pining for an old flame, because I wouldn't trade my wife for any woman on Earth. I have thought a lot about it and believe I am clinging to the naive belief -- or hope -- that people who do unkind, deceitful things always come to regret it in the end.
I am grappling with the guilt of wishing unhappiness for two people who are obviously happy together. I can't help it, but I know I'd be glad if I learned they'd broken up. I am confused and embarrassed about why I even still care. Your thoughts, please?
-- LACKING CLOSURE IN SAN JOSE
Dear Don''t Know the Way to Closure in San Jose,..
...I say a lttle prayer for you....
Forever and ever you can languish over the past...tra la la
First, you have carried this grudge too long (which you have admitted here in your note to ole Crabby) but you lost me even earlier in your story...
Where was the betrayal? You don't know that your two ships passed in the same night, you have made this assumption. So, I don't get the basis of your hurt feelings to begin with, to say nothing of this harboring of ill will for so long.
You have moved on in another relationship (happily married to a wonderful woman). If there is any betrayal going on it is you betraying your wife by keeping these feelings and wasting precious energy on feelings for another when you should devote that time and attention to the matter at hand...YOUR CURRENT MARRIAGE.
As Cher told Nicolas Cage in Moonstruck....SNAP OUTTA OF IT!!!
Of course, that movie ended differently than it should for you.
Stay the course!
Cr-Abby
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